DCOrange

I do mention who I think the best overall prospects are when you open up a prospect page, but the short cut is that they’re listed in order of my overall rankings, so I think the top 5 in order are Lamar, Darnold, Allen, Mayfield, and Rosen. I’d also say that ranking who the “best QB will be” is a pretty complicated exercise. For example, I think Mayfield and Rosen likely end up being better than Allen, but the potential with Allen is high enough that I’d take him ahead of them. Regarding the “similarly” thing, I wrote the Allen report first and originally just had it organized in a Word document so it made sense at that point and I guess I forgot to look for that when converting it to the web page.

Feel free to flame away, but I figured some of you guys would enjoy reading this. I plan to build it out a bit more with my free time to add some of the fancy charts I threw together throughout the draft process. This webpage was originally designed to basically bring all the videos on each prospect together under one roof. I got busy at work/some of the sources I used for videos got banned from YouTube and I'm now beginning to repurpose it for basically a historical catalog of my take on the QBs. Obviously I had opinions on last year's class, but I have no proof of how I felt about them at the time, but beginning with the 2018 class, you can view my thoughts, comparisons, etc. through the following link. The home page and 2019 draft class pages are all under construction still (unchanged from how I had originally designed them, but you'll see a drop down menu under 2018 prospects that lists the QBs based on my personal rankings and each prospect's page has a scouting report (reports are smaller once you get past Luke Falk). https://draftqbs.wordpress.com/2018-draft-prospects/

As I mentioned in my follow-up post, what he was able to do in college is a testament to how talented he is because his footwork is holding him back a ton and he still showed off really impressive ball placement more often than not in college while also being more of an anticipatory passer than most of the other guys in this draft class. I'm slowly starting to think he's more of a project than people let on though, and it's making me reconsider my ranking of him. If I believe both of them are projects, do I still prefer Darnold over a guy like Josh Allen that has far better physical tools to work with? I don't really know to be honest; I'm starting to see why the Browns are reportedly so tempted to go with Allen instead. Edit: Sidenote, you can definitely see the Allen-overstriding thing that I believe Jordan Palmer referred to in an interview a little while back.

Watching more of his 2017 tape again, I still like Darnold quite a bit. His footwork is pretty horrifying though. It's a testament to his abilities that he's as productive as he is while setting his feet to throw maybe like 20% of the time but I think he's going to be a bust if he can't fix his footwork. A lot of potential there for him to increase his ball velocity if he gets his mechanics right (and I'm not even talking about the loopy throwing motion; that's an eyesore but the footwork is way more important).

I'm still Team Darnold > Rosen (though neither is my #1 guy), but this performance wasn't nearly as good as I remembered lol. Seems like it's his version of the overrated Rosen vs. A&M game.

When I took it, Falk was compared to Colt Brennan lol

Charlie Campbell saying that based on what's heard, Josh Allen will be the first pick of the draft.

You missed out on a good article from a great analyst

http://www.profootballweekly.com/2018/04/21/nfl-draft-the-most-important-stat-for-every-top-qb-prospect/astrou7/ His overall QB rankings for those that are interested is: 1. Darnold - Top 5 Grade 2. Baker - Top 10 Grade 3. Rosen - Top 10 Grade 4. Lamar - 1st round Grade 5. Allen - 2nd-3rd round Grade 6. Rudolph - 2nd-3rd round Grade Some important excerpts regarding each prospect: Baker Mayfield: Lamar Jackson: Mason Rudolph: Sam Darnold: Josh Rosen: Josh Allen:

Would appear this is where the photo of Lamar at Logan Airport came from.

I’ve seen mocks with him at 17 and 23 respectively in the past couple days. I think it may have been Albert Breer that had him at 17.

I take Lamar but I think Buffalo would cry tears of joy if Allen fell to them.

Thing is that was a different staff. They were connected to Allen because of Arians’ need for a guy that focuses on the long ball. That’s no longer needed, hence bringing in two guys that tend to lean on the short stuff in Bradford and Glennon. Nobody seems to know what to expect from the Cardinals now but based on the few dots that we have to connect, I would think the previous regime was much higher on Allen than the new one is (doesn’t mean the new regime doesn’t like Allen though). seems like Buffalo could wait a little longer to move up if things played out this way but I suspect that they’d consider it a win if they only give up one first round pick and get the guy I suspect they have at 1 or 2 on their board.

Darnold is the one that everyone always refers to as having the clutch gene. No idea what the numbers would suggest. I’d assume Mayfield since he was so dominant statistically.

For what it’s worth, the Bills O/U in Vegas is 6.5 wins

Obviously the draft can change things but I expect 5-7 wins which is basically the exact range Clay’s official predictions falls within. Think his predictions pegged Buffalo for 6 wins based on predicted point differential and that’s exactly where the Bills point differential ended up.

I'm pretty much locked in on Lamar Jackson. Darnold is my #2 QB in the class, and I'd love to have Allen or Mayfield too, but there's really no sense in trading up for one of them when Buffalo can get the guy I want the most at 12 (or maybe a tiny tick above 12).

I would say he's a very low upside pick. A team that's simply looking for a backup QB (ex: Tampa) might value him but I don't really see any reason for a team looking for a starter to do so.

Once the splits on his pass attempts start to resemble more of what you see in the NFL, I'd bet he's able to hit 60%. Hell, he might hit 60% just by playing behind a better O-Line. If you split up his numbers between under pressure vs. kept clean and then weight it as if he was kept clean as often as Mason Rudolph, Rosen is around 61%.

It looks a lot better when you trim the comeback down to 1:00 showing only the good/lucky plays. Rosen was not good in that game IMO. During the comeback alone, he had like 3-5 plays that would be easy turnovers in the NFL and that's not even getting into how he helped them to get into that hole in the first place. Rosen has plenty of games where he played very well, but this isn't one of the games I'd use if I'm trying to highlight him.

This is essentially what that new football league is doing, except I think it's just a 4th and 10 for them. "Namely, there will be no kickoffs. Teams will start with possession at their own 25-yard line. While this does eliminate onside kick attempts, teams can try to keep possession after they score. That team will be given the ball at their own 35-yard line, and will be given a fourth-and-10 to begin the “drive.” If the team converts the fourth-and-10, then the team will keep possession. If not, then the other team will gain possession." Personally, I think the idea makes a lot of sense (though I think 4th and 15 is probably better in terms of creating similar odds to converting an onside).

I wish I were confident that Buffalo likes him, but the only real hope is that they've orchestrated a fantastic smokescreen.

For whatever it’s worth, one of the Browns radio guys says he knows for a fact that the coaching staff doesn’t want Darnold. He says it’s down to Allen and Mayfield in their mind.

In this scenario, the person I'm responding to is saying that Rosen and Mayfield are a tier below Darnold and Allen. It absolutely is relevant. It's ridiculous to think that this year is so radically different from the past that trades that generally prove to cost 3-4 times more than the reward is suddenly a worthy investment now, especially considering the volume of options available this season. If anything, the argument should be that with as many options as this year's QB class has, trading up should be expected to carry even less value because the volume will likely push worthy draft picks down lower.

I'd be okay with a small trade up, but I'd prefer to stay at 12 rather than trading up for the #2 pick for example.